Civilization: The MMO?

From our 'Putting Words In Sid Meier's Mouth' desk.

Newish community-written site Gamersglobal chucked up an exclusive interview with cuddly ol' Sid Meier over the weekend. He was there primarily to talk about Civilization Revolution, the upcoming console reimagining of the strategy daddy, but dropped in this intruiging bombshell:

"I certainly would like to play around with a MMO concept in the future... I enjoy the idea of doing something I haven’t done before, so a MMO would fit perfectly, but I really can’t say if that would be the next game we do or if it’s still a couple of games down the road before we come to that. Because I have new single player games I want to do, as well."

Start your speculat-o-engines now. A confirmation it isn't, but it's a generous amount of fuel to the gossip fire. Sid's major franchises, Civ and Pirates, both seem brimming with potential for a massively multi rebirth (though Pirates of the Burning Sea has already had an unofficial crack at the latter). Of course, we'd all love to see Alpha Centauri revisited too. So which will it be? Or will it, in a shocking break with Firaxis tradition, be a new IP entirely?